Chattman v. Toho Tenax Am., Inc.
| Decision Date | 23 August 2012 |
| Docket Number | No. 10–5306.,10–5306. |
| Parties | Everett CHATTMAN, Plaintiff–Appellant, v. TOHO TENAX AMERICA, INC., Defendant–Appellee. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
ARGUED:Mark N. Foster, Law Office of Mark N. Foster, Rockwood, Tennessee, for Appellant. Teresa Rider Bult, Constangy, Brooks & Smith, Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellee. ON BRIEF:Mark N. Foster, Law Office of Mark N. Foster, Rockwood, Tennessee, for Appellant. Teresa Rider Bult, Constangy, Brooks & Smith, Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellee.
Before: WHITE and STRANCH, Circuit Judges; and COHN, District Judge.*
Everett Chattman appeals the district court's grant of summary judgment to his employer on his claims of racial discrimination. Following recent Supreme Court precedent, we REVERSE and REMAND for trial.
It is undisputed that Plaintiff–Appellant Everett “Sly” Chattman had been an able employee at the Rockwood, Tennessee plant of Defendant–Appellee Toho Tenax America, Inc. (“Toho”) for 20 years at the time the events giving rise to this litigation took place. During the relevant time period, Chattman, an African American, worked as a shipping coordinator. Chattman alleges that Jeff Tullock, a Caucasian and then Human Resources Director at the Rockwood facility, harbored racial bias against African Americans, including Chattman himself. Chattman alleges Tullock's racial animus motivated Tullock's recommendation that upper management terminate Chattman's employment following an incident of horseplay.
Chattman offers three incidents in which Tullock made racial comments as evidence of his animosity toward African Americans. In the Spring of 2007, Tullock told a “joke” that O.J. Simpson was innocent and that Nicole Brown was killed by their son because O.J. Simpson responded to a question from his son by answering “go axe your mother.” Around February 2008, Tullock responded to another employee's complaint that her son had gotten into trouble at school for fighting by saying A few days later, Tullock commented about then-Presidential-candidate Barack Obama by saying “well you better look close at Obama's running mate because Americans won't allow a nigger president.”
On October 2, 2007, Chattman and a Caucasian coworker, Frank Johnson, engaged in horseplay on the facility floor. According to Chattman, he asked Johnson to help move some boxes to another area. Johnson reacted by joking with Chattman that “you are not my damn boss.” Chattman then bear-hugged Johnson and told him to help, released him, and both began laughing. Johnson subsequently went to the hospital to be examined and filed an incident report for workers' compensation purposes. Chattman alleges he thought nothing of this incident, as he and his coworkers commonly engaged in this type of horseplay.
Later on the same day, Chattman was called to a meeting with Tullock, Toho's Vice President of Operations, Ben Chandler, and Chattman's immediate supervisor, Scottie Smith. Tullock informed Chattman that Johnson had said Chattman body-slammed him. Tullock also stated he had received written statements from two witnesses confirming the attack.1 Tullock and Chandler immediately suspended Chattman pending a full investigation of the incident.2
From this point forward, Tullock appears to have misinformed various members of upper management about the investigation process. For example, Chandler, in his deposition, stated that he, Tullock, and Smith discussed what to do about the incident and agreed not to make any decision or recommendation until after speaking to someone at the corporation's Human Resources and Legal departments. However, after that meeting, Tullock called Jeff Lane, Vice President of Human Resources at Toho's parent company, and recommended Chattman be terminated. In his deposition, Tullock recalled telling Lane that “Ben [Chandler] and I were both recommending termination and Scotty [Smith] as well.” Chandler and Smith both deny they recommended termination.3
Further, according to Lane's deposition testimony, he told Tullock to conduct a full investigation, suggesting no final decision had been made as to disciplining Chattman. However, Tullock told Verbruggen in a subsequent email that he had spoken to Lane and that Lane had agreed to terminate Chattman during their phone conversation.
Connie Jackson, Toho's IT Manager, sent Verbruggen an email at the end of the workday on October 2, 2007 to warn Verbruggen of facts she believed important:
[Y]ou need to know the following. First, horseplay is very common on the plant floor. It is part of the plant culture and this incident is by no means an isolated case. Even if the policy says that horseplay is not tolerated, I believe the accepted practice takes precedence, legally. The fact that Frank [Johnson] claims to be injured makes the result different, but the conduct and the intention are the same as the horseplay that goes on every day. Second, Jeff Tullock has told at least one racial joke, that several members of management overheard, which could bring his motivation into question. And third, Frank has a history of making questionable worker's comp claims and receiving time off and money associated with them. If Sly is fired and he pursues legal action, these facts will be brought out in the discovery phase of the case. This could be very damaging to our company.
(R.28–5, Jackson Email 10/2/2007).
The next day, October 3, 2007, Verbruggen called Lane and told him that Johnson had been telling coworkers differing versions of his story about what happened with Chattman and asked Lane to accompany him to Rockwood to investigate the incident. On October 4, 2007, Lane and Verbruggen interviewed Chattman, Johnson, and the two witnesses. Bothered by the inconsistencies between Johnson's version of the horseplay incident and the versions recounted by the other three, Lane and Verbruggen agreed that Chattman and Johnson both be given a final written warning.4 According to Toho policy, a final written warning is the corrective action that is taken immediately prior to termination, and it remains active for one year. During that period, the employee is ineligiblefor promotions. On approximately the 8th or 9th of October, Lane instructed Tullock to prepare a formal written warning for Chattman. Lane concedes, however, that Tullock did not actually do so until December 20, when he completed an “Associate Counseling Notice,” back-dated to October 2.
Chattman alleges that the final written warning kept him from receiving a promotion.5 Smith, Chattman's immediate supervisor, had accepted a position out-of-state, and late in 2007 the Rockwood management began discussing who would take over Smith's supervisory duties. Sometime after the investigation but before December 20, 2007, Smith and another supervisor, Jamie Nelson, agreed that a new shipping supervisor position should be created to cover Smith's duties and that Chattman should be given the position. Smith states that he and Nelson met with Chandler and made their recommendation, and that after that meeting Smith “thought at that point that Chandler had agreed to promote Plaintiff.” Smith did not believe at that time that the company was going to discipline, or had disciplined, Chattman for the Johnson incident. Chattman alleges that before Tullock gave him the written warning in December, Chandler told Chattman that he would promote him to a supervisory position “when all this dies down.” Tullock's issuance of the final written warning on December 20 made Chattman ineligible for a promotion at that time.
Ultimately, Chandler decided not to create the proposed shipping supervisor position, but instead distributed Smith's duties among existing employees. No applications were ever accepted for such a position. Chandler alleges that Chattman's final written warning had no bearing on his decision not to create the supervisory position. As of the date of oral argument, Chattman remains employed at Toho as a shipping coordinator.
Chattman's complaint asserted claims under Title VII and the Tennessee Human Rights Act (“THRA”). After answering, Defendant moved for summary judgment, stating that Chattman had pointed to no adverse employment action taken against him and that, even if such action was taken, Chattman could not prove pretext.
On February 22, 2010, the district court granted Defendant's motion for summary judgment. Specifically, the district court, addressing Chattman's THRA claim in the context of Title VII, applied the McDonnell Douglas burden-shifting framework to those claims and found that Chattman had failed to make a prima facie case for failure to promote, and also had failed to prove pretext in the face of Defendant's nondiscriminatory reasons for disciplining him. Chattman now appeals the district court's grant of summary judgment to Toho on his Title VII and THRA claims, raising a number of alleged errors.6 The parties address these claims as if they were one single claim, as the district court did.
This Court reviews the grant of summary judgment de novo. Spees v. James Marine, Inc., 617 F.3d 380, 388 (6th Cir.2010). Summary judgment is appropriate if the record shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(a) (2010). The moving party has the burden of proving the absence of a genuine issue of material fact and its entitlement to summary judgment as a matter of law. Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 323, 106 S.Ct. 2548, 91 L.Ed.2d 265 (1986). All facts, including inferences, are viewed in...
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